Rising From The Flames

Chapter 11 - What We're Doing Now

Entering the room, Jen didn't really know what to think at first. Normally, for undercover missions, their safe house would be in some shit hole hotel that nobody would ever think to look for them in. As soon as they pulled up though, he knew that it wasn't going to be the case. 

On the far window, a glass wall covered every square inch from start to finish. The balcony was lifted high into the air with white flooring and a black metal railing. among this addition, a nice view of the ocean claimed its stake outside. 

"Holy shit..." the words left his mouth without say. 

Wood floors, white walls, a king sized bed, a kitchen and a bathroom?

"Am I dead?" he somewhat joked looking around. 

Chuckling, Calvin shook her head. "Don't get too comfortable in it, you won't be spending too much time here."

"How did you pay for this?!"

"Kick's dead." She threw the bags onto the bed and immediately started unpacking. "But his bank account isn't."

Immediately he couldn't help but laugh. 

"Alright. So, what's up first?"

"First we have to get a layout of the island."

"What do you mean?"

"We walk the streets, survey, the population, patterns of traffic, hot spots, anything that we can use to our advantage when this all goes down."

"Does that mean the beach?"

Calvin did her best to ignore him. "We're going to start on the east side and work our way to the west, follow the sun."

"The sun's about to go down, does that mean we can go to the beach?"

"The night is when we make our move."

"Already? Tonight!?"

"We tap his compound, use your tech head to get into his phone system so we can see what he's doing."

With a snuff, Jake started pulling out his gear. "You're so demanding." Of course, just like normal, Cal ignored him. "I like it." 

"I'm going to kill you."

"How many times are you going to say that?"

"As many times as it takes for your ass to believe it." 

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Brushing past everyone in the streets, Calvin pushed her shoulder up against Jake's every now and again pushing him what direction she wanted to go. It was a long walk, but every step had meaning. On both of them, a small map recorded how fast, how long, and how populated each street was. At certain checkpoints, Jake was able to signal where local authority posts were- everything laying out just how they needed to. 

"So how much further do we have to go?" He asked somewhat impatient referring to Simmons compound. 

Clearing her throat, she dropped her head. "The property line starts about three miles north of our position." 

"You know, you don't always have to talk in such spy kid lingo." 

"This isn't a vacation you idiot." 

"Why can't it be?"

"You're kidding right now, right?"

Taking an abrupt right, they dove into a nearby alley and picked up their speed. Jake just followed her, he had no idea where to go. "Of course I'm joking Cal. I know why we're here, but that doesn't mean we can't do other things while we're here!"

"What do you mean, other things?" her taunting eyes looked back towards him before she grabbed a hold of a fire escape. 

Mindlessly, he followed her up the ladder towards the roof of the building. 

"I don't know! normal things." 

"Your version of normal scares me."

both rose to their feet on the roof. "Why does everyone say that?"

With a shake of the head, Cal took her binoculars out of her backpack and crouched on the ledge. Jake stood in the back watching her do so for a minute. Beyond her, the sun was starting to dip below the ocean before them. A soft breeze pushed her hair back and forth, each sway matching the sound of the ocean.

Calvin was dangerous, everyone who knew of her knew that. There weren't many that got close to her. The ones that did- they seemed to disappear. That's just how it was, there wasn't anything she could do about it. But here he was, he was always going to be here. 

"So what are we looking at?" he crouched beside her. Slowly Cal handed him the binoculars. 

"You see the lights just above the treeline?"

It took a while for them to focus, but eventually he was able to make out what she was talking about. "Yeah, is that it?"

"Yeah." 

"What's up with the big fences?"

"Simmons was always anal about his security. Never like anyone coming in, and only trusted a certain group to go out."

"So it's like a prison in there?"

"For the poor, yea I suppose." She bit her lip and sighed. "They get good pay, good housing, they just lose their freedom to leave."

That was a new branch to this that he didn't know. "Why not? What does he think they would do?"

Taking the binoculars back, Cal sighed and bit her lip. "Exactly what we're doing now."